Every Last Beat

by Nicole S. Goodin

  I don’t know what they did for a job or how many people they left behind.

  I don’t know a single thing about them, so I know it’s time to reach out now.

  The only option I have is a letter. I can give a letter to the hospital’s transplant co-ordinator, who will pass it onto the family of my donor. It’s up to them if they want to reply, or even read it at all, and even if I never hear back, at least I’ll know I tried.

  I don’t know what I’m supposed to write – I don’t know the right way to thank someone for the unbelievable gift I’ve been given.

  I could ask Rylan for help, but he already does so much for me, and this feels like something I need to do on my own.

  I started this journey a long time ago, and I need to finish this final chapter. Who knows what might happen after that – maybe sometime soon I’ll be ready to close the book entirely.

  I think about the selfless gesture that organ donation is.

  I think about the people my donor left behind.

  I think about the heart beating in my chest and how I owe my life to someone else.

  Each thump of the borrowed organ is so important, so significant that suddenly I know exactly what I need to say.

  I reach for a sheet of paper and a pen and write from deep inside my soul.

  To the owner of my heart,

  You don’t know me, and I know you can’t read this, but I still need to write it.

  My name is Violet Miller, and four years ago, you saved my life.

  If you hadn’t have ticked that little box labelled ‘donor’, it’s entirely possible I wouldn’t be here right now, so for that I thank you – you chose to be selfless where you could have been selfish instead.

  There’s no possible way I could ever repay you, so instead I’ll spend the rest of my life living, really living each moment as it was intended to be lived. I can’t give you much, but I can do that – for both of us.

  There’s so many things I wish I could say to you, and it hurts me to know that I’ll never get the chance.

  I want you to know that I’m so, so sorry. I can’t even begin to explain the guilt I carry with me every day, knowing that your life was given in exchange for mine.

  Why am I here, and you’re not?

  I know that’s a question I’ll probably never get an answer to.

  There’s a lot of things in this world that make sense to me, but why I was spared when others were taken is something I’m not sure I’ll ever understand.

  I hope that whoever you left behind is managing as best they can. I may not have met you, but I don’t need to have known you to understand the hole you left in the lives of those closest to you.

  I’ve thought a lot lately about fate, and what happens when we die… I’m still not sure exactly what I believe, but I do think that there’s some place good for those who deserve it, and I know that wherever that is, you’re there.

  I have so many questions about you, but I know it’s not my place to ask. I don’t expect your family or friends to give me those answers, they’ve given me enough already. I just hope they can find some peace knowing that I’m alive because of you.

  Thank you for my life, I promise to live it.

  Violet – The keeper of your heart.

  Chapter Fifty-Six

  Rylan

  I knock lightly on the door to the small office I haven’t set foot in for over four years.

  I’m in such a different place now than I was back then, that it really doesn’t look like the same room at all as I open the door.

  The paintings on the walls are brighter now, the room doesn’t feel like it’s caving in around me anymore, and I notice the light streaming in through the window, rather than the dark shadows that light creates.

  I’m a different person than I was.

  I have Violet to thank for that.

  The only constant between my life then and my life now, is her.

  She was the light back then, and she’s been that same light every day for the past year I’ve spent with her.

  “Dr. Wilder.” The middle-aged woman smiles at me.

  She’s a work colleague I don’t see often – this hospital is a big place, but yet I don’t think I’ll ever forget her face.

  She was my counsellor for a year. I may not have thought that we made one single inch of progress in that time, but given that I’m here now and I’m doing so much better, I have to admit that maybe it did help me in some small way.

  “Rylan, please,” I tell her as I take the seat she’s indicating I should sit in.

  This whole set up feels like I’ve been sent to the principal’s office. I don’t know why I’m here, but I have a feeling in the pit of my gut that it’s serious.

  “Rylan.” She smiles at me.

  I don’t smile back; I can’t seem to make the muscles in my cheeks work.

  “You’re probably wondering why I asked you in here.”

  “I am.”

  “I was wondering if we could talk about your sister for a minute.”

  I can’t fathom for a second what she would possibly want to talk to me about in regards to my sister.

  Daisy has been gone for a long time now.

  As much as I’m confused by this topic, I’m also proud of myself for thinking of Daisy without the pain and heartache I’ve long since grown accustomed to.

  I’m making progress – they might only be small steps, like contacting some of the people I let slip away during my grief, but for me, it feels like a huge leap I’m taking in the right direction.

  I know I have Violet to thank for that too.

  I still don’t talk about Daisy a lot, and I haven’t managed to put up or even share with Violet all our old photos yet, but it’s progress, and my heart doesn’t ache the same way when I think of her anymore.

  I still miss her like crazy, and I think there will always be a little piece of me that’s missing, but this is the most whole I’ve felt in a very long time.

  “Rylan?” she asks, and I realise I never answered her.

  “Sorry, sure, go ahead.”

  “Do you recall, when you began your employment here, that you were asked to fill out a few pages of questions?”

  I know exactly what she’s talking about.

  The questionnaire is designed as a safe guard – a guide for the families and loved ones of the doctors and nurses that work in this hospital should anything ever happen to us.

  I’ve seen what can happen in an emergency situation, a patient is brought in and their family has no idea what they would have wanted in terms of medical intervention.

  When I started here, I answered questions about who I wanted notified if anything might happen to me, whether I’d want to be resuscitated or have my life artificially prolonged… if I agreed to have my organs harvested for donation or my body donated to science.

  “I remember,” I tell her.

  “Do you also remember giving authority at the time of Daisy’s death to honour all of the decisions she made on her form?”

  My sister worked here too – she answered the same questions I did.

  I nod, my throat feeling suddenly thick with emotion.

  I can remember the moment as though it were only yesterday.

  I signed that sheet of paper without a second thought – whatever Daisy wanted, that was what she got. She always knew better than me when it came to these kinds of things, but even if she didn’t, I would never have gone against the wishes of my sister on the day of her death.

  I still don’t know what her final requests were, but I agreed to all of them without a moment’s hesitation.

  “I have a letter here for you… it’s from a patient whom Daisy donated an organ to.”

  I don’t even realise that I’ve been staring at the ground until I hear her words and my head snaps up.

  “Daisy was a donor?”

  She nods at me. “She donated to five deserving people.”

  I don’t know why the po
ssibility never occurred to me before now, but of course Daisy was a donor.

  She was one of the most generous people I’ve ever met.

  “No one told me,” I whisper.

  “Perhaps you didn’t want to hear it?” she offers.

  When Daisy was brought in, I couldn’t bring myself to ask the extent of the damage caused by the crash, let alone if something like organ donation was a viable option, so instead I stuck my head in the sand and questioned nothing at all.

  Much like I did my friends, I shut out any and all things Daisy for a long time, so there’s a good chance someone did try to tell me, but I just wasn’t willing to listen.

  I don’t know how I feel about the fact that there are five people out there in the world, each carrying around a little part of my sister, but I know that Daisy would have wanted it to be this way.

  “You said there was a letter?” My voice is hoarse and scratchy.

  She nods and hands it over to me. “I’ll give you a minute alone.”

  I don’t look up as she exits the room.

  There’s a thin envelope in my hands that feels like a heavy brick, and all of a sudden, I have to know what it says.

  I tear the flap open and pull out the letter from inside.

  My hands are shaking so badly it takes me a couple of attempts to read the first few lines, and when I do, the sheet of paper falls to the floor.

  To the owner of my heart,

  You don’t know me, and I know you can’t read this, but I still need to write it.

  My name is Violet Miller, and four years ago, you saved my life…

  Chapter Fifty-Seven

  Violet

  Even though we’ve unofficially been living together with Bear for what feels like forever, it’s never felt more real than it does today. Rylan’s not even here right now, but my home is so filled with him I can barely remember what it was like before he appeared in my life.

  There’s a whole pile of boxes stacked against the wall, and even though I’m expecting him home any time now to help me, I can’t seem to stop myself from taking one down and starting to unpack it.

  It’s labelled ‘photos’ and I have to admit that it’s got my curiosity piqued.

  Rylan talks about his parents often and while I’ve seen a couple of pictures of his late father and his elderly mother, I’m still yet to see even one of his sister Daisy.

  I know it’s not for the fact that he doesn’t want to show me, but that it just hurts him too much – he never fully dealt with his sister’s death, but I think that these past few months he’s finally starting to heal.

  I glance at the clock again.

  There’s a sensation lurking around me like I’m doing something wrong, but I shove it aside. Rylan and I are in this life together – I know that nothing that lives in a box could possibly come between us.

  I lift the lid and find a few albums, some frames and a couple of stacks of photos.

  I shuffle through a few until I spot an envelope.

  There’s only two photos inside, I recognise one as Rylan’s mum and dad when they were younger. I smile at the obvious love between them – his dad is looking at his mum the same way that Rylan looks at me.

  This photo deserves to be in a frame, displayed proudly on the wall, so I sit it down on the table to tell Rylan when he gets home that we’ll be doing exactly that with it.

  I pull the other photo from the envelope at the same time as I hear the front door open.

  I clutch my chest in shock, I can’t believe what I’m seeing.

  The image that has taken my breath away is of Rylan, he’s about ten years younger here than he is now and he’s so handsome, but it’s not that – it’s the woman next to him, who I now have no doubt is his sister, that’s caused me to gasp aloud.

  I know this woman, and the realisation of exactly who she is steals the last of my reservations about fate.

  “Violet.” Rylan’s voice startles me.

  I turn and look at him, and he’s there, his eyes filled with what appears to be total disbelief.

  We stand unmoving, staring at one another in wonder.

  In my hand is the photo that’s just completely blown my mind, and in his, he holds a sheet of paper that signifies the final piece of our puzzle clicking into place.

  Epilogue

  Violet

  I hear someone clinking cutlery against glass, indicating that they want to make a speech and I spin around, looking for the speaker.

  I recognise his voice a fraction of a second before my eyes land on his face, in all its smiling perfection.

  The earth has circled the sun five times since he officially came into my life, yet every time I look into his startling blue eyes; it feels like the very first time.

  “I’d like to make a toast.” He smiles at me and my belly flips.

  I don’t know how he does that. He still has the power to turn my insides to mush, even after all these years.

  “Thank you all for coming… there’s two very special women I need to make mention of tonight, the first being my beautiful wife.”

  He smiles so wide at me that everybody else in the room follows suit, looking at me and smiling along with him.

  I know I’m bright red, but I don’t care, his words mean more to me than anybody else’s and right now, he’s all I can see.

  “The art you’re about to witness, she has been working on for literally her entire life. She has laid herself bare on those canvases, and for her to allow the whole world to see them is certainly no small feat.”

  He looks at me with such tenderness in his eyes I have to fight to hold his gaze rather than shy away from it.

  “I can personally vouch for the rollercoaster of emotions that you’ll experience when you walk through those doors… because trust me; some of those paintings have the power to bring you to your knees.”

  The skin on my arms has broken out into goosebumps now; all the individual little hairs are standing up on end. He’s the only person close to me to see my collection in its entirety thus far, and I know he means every word he’s saying.

  Lucy reaches for my hand and grips it tightly in hers.

  Her belly is round for the third time and her skin is positively glowing again, only this time it’s not her bun she’s cooking in her oven, it’s mine.

  I squeeze her hand back appreciatively; I’m so incredibly grateful for the selfless woman I get to call my best friend. She knows me as well as she knows herself, so she of all people understands exactly how nervous I am right now.

  “Congratulations, gorgeous, I can’t think of a single person who deserves this moment more than you do.” Rylan lifts his flute of wine in my direction.

  I hold back tears as I walk towards him and he wraps me in his strong, safe arms while everybody around us claps and cheers.

  “Thank you,” I murmur against his chest.

  He kisses the top of my head and when I pull away, he tucks me into his side, his arm wrapping protectively around me, the same way it always has.

  “But there’s also one other woman I need to thank tonight.”

  I already know what he’s going to say next, and just the mere thought of it has the first of what I’m sure will be many tears slipping down my face.

  “My sister.”

  Everyone is watching him closely, intrigued by his words. He’s always been the kind of man that commands the attention of a room, but I think we can all feel that this is something more.

  “All of you already know that some years back, Violet’s life was saved when she received a heart transplant… but there’s one thing that some of you probably don’t know, something that neither Violet or I knew when we first met either.”

  I think back to the moment when I decided that I undoubtedly believed in fate.

  “A few years ago, Violet reached out to her donor’s family, she wrote a beautiful, heartfelt letter expressing how grateful she was… and not long after, I received a letter. It was from
a bright, incredible woman who told me that someone in my family had saved her life… it was only then that I realised my sister was her donor.”

  I hear a few gasps from the crowd.

  He looks down at me now, his eyes glistening with unshed tears, but his expression bright and happy.

  He’s finally made peace with the tragedy that took his sister’s life and in turn, gave me mine.

  “My sister gave life to the woman who would later become the love of mine and I know it was her that brought the two of us together.”

  He kisses my head again, but I know this time it’s for his benefit, not mine. He draws strength from being close to me, and he needs that strength right now as he talks about the possibility of my life coming to an end and as he relives the memory of his sister losing hers.

  “Violet’s told me about how she technically died once, when she was twenty-one years old… she told me about her heart going into cardiac arrest and about the woman who brought her back from the brink of death. But it wasn’t until much later on that I knew without a shadow of a doubt that it was my sister Daisy that brought Violet and I together.”

  My mum, dad and brother are eyeing me curiously now, but Auggie, she just looks totally serene – like maybe she already knows what’s coming.

  He turns so he’s speaking directly to my family. “My sister was a cardiologist… you knew her actually… she would have introduced herself as Dr. White – she was the woman who saved Violet’s life that day.”

  I can hear my mum sobbing now as the weight of what he’s saying presses down on all of us. We chose to save that final piece of information for this exact moment and I’m glad we did. Daisy’s memory deserves this honour.

  The fact that Dr. White – the woman who brought me back to life and then treated me for the months that followed afterwards – is not only his sister, but also my donor, still blows my mind each and every time I think about it.